Hla Myint, Burmese economist, Died at 97

Hla was recognized as one of the pioneers of development economics as well as for his contributions to welfare economics.

Myint has stressed, long before it became well known, the importance of export-orientation as the most useful “engine of growth”.

He received his Ph.D. in economics at the London School of Economics (with a thesis on the Theories of Welfare Economics), he taught as an economics professor at the University of Rangoon, from 1945 to 1952.

Myint also served as the university’s rector from 1958 to 1962.

Myint served as an Economic Adviser to the post-independent Burmese government’s National Planning Department and the State Agricultural Bank’s committee in the 1950s.

He was influential in the National Planning Committee’s drafting of an outward-looking economic development plan for the country, which was rejected in favor of an insular, inward-looking plan.

He was appointed as the Emeritus Professor of Economics, teaching development economics, at the London School of Economics from 1966 to 1985.